Transcript: “You went to Dan-druff?” asked Brian. “That guy! You know he interviewed with us three times.”

After sitting on it for a few days, Linda told Brian about her brush with potential cybercrime. He was of the impression that setting her money on fire would have been as effective as paying Stinky Dan for retribution against the “Moldovan hackers.”

“Whoever is running these accounts is probably not even in Moldova. You want me to bring it to work? I could do some digging,” offered Brian. “Though I agree with Dan-druff that making a blocklist and getting on with your life is probably the best course of action.”

“But, like, they made a macabre puppet of my Aunt Rose,” said Linda. She’d had a few days to think of exactly what bothered her about this.

“I know. And that’s shitty,” said Brian. “But it’s happening all over the internet. Maybe you should sue Bleater. Be some kind of landmark case.”

Linda knew he was kidding, but this new direction felt like something to do. The world was changed by people taking action, after all. So armed with the list of IP addresses Stinky Dan had compiled, Linda went to see her old college pal Nessa, who had helped her with some of the paperwork for setting up the pizza place.

“Linda, it’s family law,” said Nessa when Linda showed up at her office. Nessa was sat at her desk piled high in files and papers, an untouched takeaway container from a lunch that should have been eaten hours ago sitting precariously close to the edge. “I practice family law.”

She was dressed in a rumpled nice-ish suit, and her long hair was hastily pulled back with … was that a pencil? Did anyone do that outside of movies about busy lawyers.

“You’re the only lawyer I know,” said Linda.

“I know,” said Nessa, with a sigh. “I’m the only lawyer everyone knows. Let me poke around, see what I can find that might point you in the right direction. Is there internet law? Get out of here; I’ll let you know if I find anything.”

“Just one more question. Would you be able to represent me if I was associated with a cybercrime?”

“Jesus Christ, Linda!”

“OK. I’m going. Do you want these?” Linda asked, waving the printout of numbers she had brought.

“No,” said Nessa. “Put them on … this pile.”

Things moved slowly in real life. In an action movie, Linda felt they’d be in some kind of chase scene, shaking down bad guys and getting some answers. In this world, Nessa got back to Linda to say she wasn’t really sure there was anything actionable to prosecute.

“I can write you a stern email,” she told her. “But there’s really not much to do here that would be worth the cost of the court filing fees. Unless you want to pioneer a class action suit.”

“How would we do that?” asked Linda.

“Oh, God! I was kidding!” said Nessa. “I don’t have the resources for that?”

Linda was disappointed. She accepted her sternly worded email as a consolation prize, but she didn’t actually have any place to send it. Squatty offered to print it in the next issue of the zine, and that was kind of that. It was very unsatisfying.

The weather, meanwhile, continued to be cloudy and cold. After having perfect conditions every day, people were starting to notice and grumble. But to Linda, it felt like a return to normalcy. People should experience some discomfort, she thought. It was good for resilliancy and moral fiber, or something.

Anyway, Linda poured all of that dissatisfied energy into working with Squatty and the boys on the zines. She wasn’t sure that her writing was any good, but it was words.

Squatty was very encouraging. “Self-expression is the thing!” he said. “It’s what life is made of.”